


Serrated

by Onehundredcandlesburning



Category: Actor RPF, British Actor RPF
Genre: Comfort/Angst, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-20
Updated: 2014-04-20
Packaged: 2018-01-20 02:10:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,586
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1492858
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Onehundredcandlesburning/pseuds/Onehundredcandlesburning
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The morning after. Tom and Ella are both in their own private hell until the silence is broken and Tom finds the strength to confront the elephant in the room.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Serrated

**Author's Note:**

> This work is now set up as a part of the Cutlery work (which started life as a one-shot and has evolved into a multi-chap). To read through the entire work or navigate easier...   
> http://archiveofourown.org/works/1482229/chapters/3127369
> 
> Throwing up, emotional angst

The alarm cut through the stilled morning like a serrated knife carving through a cardboard box. It didn’t help that she had spent the night tossing and turning back and forth, unable to shake the images and sensations of the night before. Ella groaned, fumbling about in the dark until she knocked her phone to the floor with a dull thud. She reached down, finding the plug and trailing back along the cord until she managed to open one eye and swipe the screen. Silence. Just two more minutes. 

Thirty seconds later Tom’s phone went off, louder and more ferocious than Ella’s. He sighed and picked it up. His eyes still open; five hours staring up at the ceiling. He felt wretched and sore. He lifted himself out of bed and yawned loudly as he made it to the ensuite, closing the door behind him softly. 

The harsh lighting hurt his eyes, and the lack of sleep had taken its toll. He was still adjusting to the time difference. It was 1am in Toronto and he felt if he crawled back into bed he would get the sleep he needed, but also knew if he did that he would have greater difficulty adjusting tomorrow. His reflection stared back at him. Bloodshot eyes, heavy dark shadows underneath sitting in the middle of a gaunt expression. He flicked the shower on and stepped under the hot jets, trying to warm himself enough to face the cold outside for his run. 

He had contemplated skipping on it, but knew from experience that would possibly be the worst thing he could do, as come midday he would be an emotional and mental wreck, more than he was right now. 

He had just fucked up the small pocket of reality he held dear, and knew he had also hurt the person closest to him aside from his family. He placed a hand flat against the tiles and felt his stomach churn. Bracing himself he heaved up last night’s dinner, his whole body in pain, contracting and squeezing out the heaviness he had weighing down upon him. He watched the remnants wash down the drain, wanting to sob from the physical and emotional upheaval. Echoes of the night turned over and over like the pages of a flicker book. 

Instead of cartoon stick figures running on the pages, an animated and vivid image of Ella underneath him, her eyes widening as she came undone beneath him, around him. Her milky smooth skin taut across her neck as it tightened, flush in her cheeks and the sounds she made. My god, the sounds she made. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and lifted his face to the jets, opening his mouth to rinse the taste of bile away. 

“What do I want?” he muttered to himself, squeezing out the shower gel into the palm and rubbing his hands together. His head hurt. His heart ached. He didn’t want to hurt her. He was sure he had hurt her. Didn’t want to lead her on, but he felt different about her. Felt like he had found her last night, nestled deep within the little room in his heart. 

It wasn’t just a fuck. He’d had plenty of them, and it was so much more than that. The problem was he knew. He knew what he was like. He knew what she needed, what she wanted from a partner. He’d helped her come to that conclusion after her last break up. Talked her through it – at the time he had wished he didn’t have to fly out the next day and wanted to spend more time with her making sure she’d be okay. 

She needed security. She needed someone devoted to her and who wasn’t afraid to be with her, the loud, often verbose and unconventional woman that she was. The bright spark. Someone not at all intimidated by her intelligence and left-of-centre ways. He kept coming back to the security. She needed someone who would be there in her life when she needed them. Come hell or high water. He was all over the place, no regimented life and no knowing where he would find himself around the world months at a time. 

Ella herself had said it all the night before when Tom had asked her why nothing ever happened between them.  
“Because I want what you can’t give me, and I would drive you to drink.” Her voice rang in his mind. Her laughter. The way she’d call him Twhiddleston. He hated it for the first twelve months, which is why she’d call him by that name more often. Eventually, it became a term of endearment and he grew to accept and even love it, because it was from her. No one else.  
“Oh, that this too, too sullied flesh would melt.” He sighed, he pressed his forehead against the tiles and closed his eyes. You overly dramatic fool. 

Ella lay curled in fetal position on her side, knees tucked right up. An angry voice in a harsh whisper to herself.  
“Get up, get moving. Paint a smile on your face and suck it up girl. You nodded. You consented to this. Don’t look into it. He doesn’t want you, he never wanted you. His questioning last night was just to check if you still had a crush on him. Matter of fact he’s an arsehole. He took advantage of you. He was just checking to see if he could get a quick fuck out of you, that’s all, nothing more. Move. Get up. Go, now. If you are going to salvage this friendship you need to rough it up. Toughen up. Harden up. Move, girl.” She squeezed her eyes tightly and re-opened them with a new resolve, pulling the covers right back off the bed and gathering her pyjamas, pulling them back on. “It was only a matter of time until you got used like this by him. Quit fooling yourself.”

She knew she would be able to shower once Tom left for his run. The shower. She sat on the edge of the bed, listening to the water cascading and working through the pipes in the old house. Knowing he was behind that door, naked. Vulnerable. Probably had his guard up. Probably gloating. No. She chastised herself for thinking ill of her best friend and recognised her own defense mechanism. If they hurt you, push them as far away as you possibly can before they have the chance to hurt you again. Her mantra. 

The water cut off as she was still deep in argument with herself. War being waged from the inside out. She heard the buzz of his electric toothbrush for a few moments until it went silent again. A gurgling spit followed by the door creaking open. Light flooding into the bedroom along with a burst of steam. He stepped through, like some scene from a science fiction film. Having been through quarantine. Towel around his waist he stood in front of her. 

Neither spoke or moved or made eye contact for a good five minutes until they both sighed at the same time. Ella chimed in first, standing back up and stretching. Painting a smile on her face. 

“Morning! You coming for breakfast at the café? I make the best coffee this side of the Thames.” She strode past him to her overnight bag, pulling out her clothing and chucking it over to the bed, which was messed up with the covers askew from where she’d pulled them back.  
Tom sighed, taken aback by her sudden perkiness. She was never a morning person at the best of times, and he squinted at her. Surveying her, scanning her for a hole that would display her true emotional state. 

“Sure.” His voice sounded unsure. Cautious, what was she up to? She was crying last night. Why did she suddenly seem so happy.  
“Yeah so go for your run and we can wander down from there when you’re back and cleaned up if you like.”  
“La… “ Tom had a knot the size of a football in his stomach still.  
“Come on, get a wriggle on. Time’s ticking.” She busied herself, sifting through her bag, flicking and folding and riffling.  
“La, don’t…” She spun around, their eyes connected for the first time since they climaxed. Bingo. He saw deep into them, straight through her façade and deep into her pain. 

“Oh, Lala…” he took a step forward, wanting to drag her into his arms. The usual response when he recognised the terrified inner child looking back at him from behind the usually sparkling blue pools.  
“No, pfft. I’m okay. Honestly.” She took a step backwards, away from him, and broke the eye contact.  
“We need to talk, La.” His voice dropped. He clutched at his stomach, feeling the tension tighten further. 

“What do you want, Tom?” She frowned, eyes cast downwards. Expecting the conversation she knew would come ‘the morning after’.  
“What do YOU want, Ella?” He grabbed at the top of his towel, making sure it was staying up. He felt the tension ease a little when he realised how stupid that seemed, considering he was buried in her last night and as such, she had seen and felt all of him. So fussing over a towel seemed a waste of energy. 

“It doesn’t matter, Tom. I know where it’s at. I know what it was. You’d better get dressed or you’ll catch a cold.” She brushed him off.  
“Fine…” he darkened. He hated it when she’d go into denial. It was hard enough to deal with when she shut him out over someone else, now it was about him. He felt both sides of the pain. His own and hers gnawing at him. 

“Fuck it Ella… Last night meant something.” Tom’s towel dropped to the ground as he balled his fists by his sides in frustration. He looked down, shocked, then set his jaw in determination and looked straight back up at Ella.  
She plopped back onto the bed, sitting, gripping at the edge, the combination of seeing him standing completely naked before her and not seeming to care all that much and the fact he had openly admitted that last night had meant something to him.  
“Shit, Ella. Look at me.” He barked at her. Her eyes lifted to meet his again. A lump caught in her throat as she trailed along his long body, resting on his sorrowful expression.  
“It’s me, La… It’s your Twhiddleston. Talk to me?” His gaze softened as his eyebrows lifted in the middle. She smiled softly, looking as though it hurt her to do so. It was the first time in all these years she had heard him refer to himself with her nickname for him. A rare occasion indeed. 

Suddenly, her phone buzzed breaking the intensity of the moment. A reminder flashed up across her screen.  
“What is that?” Tom frowned at the distraction. Ella glanced at it.  
“Reminder to finalise enrolment paperwork for Uni.” Ella stated matter of fact. 

“Uni? Are you finally going back to finish?” Tom’s voice lifted.  
“Start over. Too late to get recognition for the two years I’ve put in.” She sighed. Tom picked up his towel and sat next to her on the side of the bed, his arm wrapping over her shoulders, he pulled her against him. Draping the towel across his lap.  
“Oh La, I’m so proud of you. Writing?”

“Yeah. I can’t work in hospitality forever.” She dropped her guard and felt normal in his embrace. Discussing anything other than last night.  
“Hey…” He reached, placing his fingertip under her chin and pulling her attention away from her phone screen. “I’m seriously proud of you, and I’m here to help if you need. I love you, Ella.” The words dropped from his lips before he had even given them thought. 

“I love you, Tom.” She whispered, fatigued at putting up a front. “More than I probably should.” She continued, much to Tom’s relief. Then the hurried burble kicked in. A million words flying out of her mouth at a million miles an hour. “And I know you don’t feel the same way, but I can’t keep playing a role with you. You know me too well… and I can’t keep being your ‘go to gal’ because after the line we crossed last night. I can’t go back.”

Her eyes began to fill with hot salty tears, one trailed down her cheek.  
“I can’t go back either, La.” Tom frowned. Coming to grips with where things were starting to sit. “I… I’m scared.” He confessed. “You’re the best thing in my life, my rock, my earth, and I’ve such a tendency to fuck things up completely. I don’t know what I’d do without you in my life...quite.” He stared straight ahead, moving his arm from Ella’s shoulder and resting on his knees with his elbows. 

“I’m scared too, Tom. Petrified.”  
“It just felt so right, to be inside of you.” His voice dropped, feeling the memory within every fibre. “To feel you against me, underneath me, around me. To… be that close to you. But I know I can’t give you what you want. I can’t just drop my career. I can’t just shift my whole life around. I…” His brow furrowed in deep thought. Ella’s head grew light. She couldn’t believe what she was hearing. 

“Are you completely serious, Tom, because if you’re not being serious about how you feel right now you are going to break my heart and…” she halted. Realising just how frightened he was of the situation. He looked at her, tears streaming silently, trailing along his sharp jawline and dropping from the side of his chin onto the towel in his lap. 

“Oh Tom… Oh … no please don’t cry, sweetheart. Please. You know I feel the same. You know how I feel. My needs can change. I can change… I am changing.” Ella knelt up on the bed and moved behind Tom, wrapping herself around him. He reached up, running his hand along her forearm across his chest.  
“I’m so scared.” He breathed, shaking in her embrace. 

“It did feel right, didn’t it.” Ella soothed him. Gently rocking him side to side, resting her chin on top of his head. He nodded slowly. Moving her head up and down with his movements.  
“I haven’t… I haven’t felt like that for such a long time. If ever.” He shifted around, facing her, taking her hands and winding his long fingers around them. He looked up into her eyes. 

“Let’s start by talking through things properly and we’ll go slowly. Work out what we want, and keep talk…” She was cut off. His lips on hers, fingers laced through her hair. His towel dropping to the floor again as he clambered up onto the bed, laying her down and moving across her. She wrapped around him, fingers nesting in his damp hair.  
“Love me like you’ve never been hurt before.” He growled against her mouth. 

She felt a burst of strength from him pulse through her, finding its way into her heart and kicking it to life. Their physical proximity pressed against one another re-awakening hope. Plugging back into the base of all they were. Flooding memories flying around them like a maelstrom, followed by peace as their movements slowed. Their frantic grasping and fondling gave way to purposeful caresses, slow and steady.


End file.
